ᴏᴜᴛᴄᴀsᴛ - ᴅʀᴀᴄᴏ ᴍᴀʟғᴏʏ x ᴍᴀʟᴇ!ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ

- ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ ғɪᴠᴇ -

After what Hagrid had called "Gringotts", we went through various shoppes, bookstores, cauldron stores, potion shoppes. Hagrid had gone off to get a drink and had left Harry and I at "Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions" to buy our robes. 

"Hogwarts? Been having the lot of you here recently — there's a young boy over there being fitted right now," a short woman clothed in mauve robes spoke from behind them. She nodded towards the back of the store, where a pale boy standing on a short stool was being measured by flying tape measures. 

The woman, who I assumed was Madam Malkin, led Harry and me towards the back and had us stand on two stools next to him, me in between the boy and Harry. 

Madam Malkin snapped her fingers and tape measures started flying around me and Harry, taking our measurements. 

I reached for the tape measure that was zooming about the room but instead my finger was pricked with a pin.

"Shit on a brick!" I yelped, earning a few concerned glances from others in the store.

I gave them an apologetic grin and a sheepish wave even if everyone had already turned away.

The boy to my left — who had very blonde hair — was staring at me with his mouth gaping open as if he was appalled by what I had just said. I only shrug in response and turn back to the mirror, watching as the tape measure took my measurements.

"Dear, I would appreciate if you didn't use such foul language in my shoppe," Madam Malkin scolded.

"So- sorry, ma'am," I apologized. 

She nodded and walked back to what she was doing, leaving the pins and tape measures to fit us in our black robes. I watched the tools fly around me in the reflection of the mirror, trying and failing to catch anything until I heard a cough to my left.

"Hello," said the blonde after clearing his throat. "Are you two going to Hogwarts, too?"

"Nah, I want to look this stupid in public," I said before Harry could stop me. "It's a fashion choice." I grin and turn back to the mirror, my nose in the air, my stance mocking arrogance.

"Uh, excuse him," came Harry's voice. 

"He's excused," the boy answered. "Anyway, my father's next door buying my books and mother's looking at wands further down the street." He sounded rather bored, as if there was anything else he'd rather be doing. His bored expression quickly perked up as he smirked and said, "Once I'm done here, I'm off to look at racing brooms. I don't see why first years can't have their own. I reckon I can bully my father into buying me one. Then I'll smuggle it in somehow."

Well he sounds like a peach. And a prick. Like a peachy prick, I thought to myself as I resisted the urge to shake the boy. Looking over at Harry, I could tell he felt similarly. 

"Have you got yourselves your own broom?" It seemed like this boy never shut up. 

"No," Harry answered for us.

"I have one. Father says I'm sure to be picked for my house, and I agree. Do you two know which house you'll be in yet?"

I raise my hands, palms up, in a shrugging motion, interrupting the pins and earning a quick poke from one.

"Aye!" I yelp, poking back at the pins, but to no avail. 

"Would you stop yelling like an animal?" the boy asked, clearly irritated.

I was sucking in air in preparation to let out a bloodcurdling screech before Harry answered. 

"No, we don't know which 'house' we'll be in."

"Well I suppose no one really knows until they get there, do they? But I do. I know I'll be in Slytherin. All our family have—"

Before he finished, I interrupted. It was just too tempting. "So... seems like a pretty interesting house?" The boy opened his mouth to agree, but I cut him off again. "Is it a house you'd like to... slither in?" I grinned widely, proud of my joke.

"Anyway...," the boy drew on, ignoring my interruption, "I'd hate to be put in Hufflepuff. Wouldn't you? I think I'd leave." He put up a finger to silence me as soon as I opened my mouth and I clamped my mouth shut, taken aback.  "Then there's Ravenclaw. And Gryffindor." He continued, speaking the name 'Gryffindor' as if it were some sort of slur. He let his hand fall back to his side and nodded at me. "Now you may speak."

Before I could snap at the boy, Harry had kicked my heel and answered the boy with a simple, "Hmmm."

The blonde seemed to have brushed us off quickly and turned his attention to the store's window where Hagrid stood. "I say," he exclaimed. "Look at that man!"

"That's Hagrid," said Harry with way too much pride. Congrats Harry, you know his name. "He works at Hogwarts," he added.

After that, I zoned out, ignoring the two other boys and went to watching a needle with a thin black thread strung through its eye. It was fascinating how these inanimate objects acted with autonomy. I imagined getting to Hogwarts and having my bed make itself, or my clothes fold themselves, only to be knocked out of my daydreams by Harry's bland, "They're dead." 

"What? Who's dead?" I looked around, expecting to see a body on the floor — or maybe multiple since Harry had said 'they're'. 

"Our parents, (Y/N)," Harry said irritably. 

"You're brothers, then?" the blonde questioned.

"Nah, we just have the same sperm donor," I answered with a thumbs up.

Both Harry and the boy raised their brows at me, shaking my answer off. 

"But your parents, they were one of us? Our kind?" he pressed on.

"Human?" I probably sounded quite dumb, but I didn't understand this boy. What in the blimming world was he saying?

"They were a witch and wizard, if that's what you mean," Harry answered.

"Dear, you're robes are done." Madam Malkin directed the tape measures and pins and needles away from me and I stepped down, walking over to Hagrid to wait for Harry who stepped down after saying something else to the boy.

As soon as we left Madam Malkin's, Harry asked Hagrid about Quidditch and never really got much of an explanation. From what Hagrid said, it sounded like soccer. And football. But in the air. And there are murder balls.

"What the hell is a Hufflepuff?" I blurt out of nowhere, confusing both Hagrid and Harry.

"Wha- oh! School houses, (Y/N). People says Hufflepuff's a lot o' duffers," he explained.

Immediately, Harry's face fell and he mumbled, "I bet I'm in Hufflepuff."

"That's the spirit, Harry!" I say, slapping him on the back.

He looked back at me with a face that read, Really?

I know I had been snappy with Harry before, but I'd always wanted an older brother. I could settle for a twin.